Public helps Warren police find robbery suspect

STAFF REPORT

WARREN — Police, working together with the public, have again captured a suspect accused of a serious crime in Warren.

Sgt. Jeff Cole of the Warren Police Department said Tuesday that the department received more than one phone call from the public alerting police to the identity of the man seen on bank-surveillance video robbing the First Place Bank branch in the Warren Plaza on Friday morning.

The police department released a photo of the robber to the public Friday afternoon. It was shown in the media later Friday, and by 8:30 p.m., a Warren man was in custody.

The picture showed a man wearing a winter coat and stocking cap, but his face was uncovered.

Callers told police who they thought the robber was, Cole said. It helped police identify and arrest Joe Rien, 41, of Washington Street Northwest.

Tim Bowers, Warren police chief, said there are “a lot more good people in Warren than bad,” and they “want the people responsible for crime taken off the streets.”

Bowers said his department has made an effort to “overtly ask” the public for help wherever it may help, and the department will continue to do that.

Rien pleaded innocent Tuesday afternoon in Warren Municipal Court to aggravated robbery, a first-degree felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison upon conviction.

Judge Terry Ivanchak set his bond at $250,000 and said a preliminary hearing will take place within 10 days. The judge noted that a weapons charge could be added later.

Cole filed the aggravated robbery charge against Rien on Tuesday morning. Rien has been in Trumbull County Jail since his arrest.

Warren police said a man walked into the bank about 9:50 a.m. Friday, handed a teller a note, received money and walked out. No weapon was seen. A witness said she saw a man get into a tan Oldsmobile and drive off about the time of the robbery.

Police later confiscated a tan Oldsmobile in connection with the robbery and analyzed it for evidence.

Rien has no previous record with Warren Municipal Court or the Warren Police Department.

Warren police also received information from the public that helped identify a suspect in a homicide that occurred Oct. 3 in the parking lot of the Big Apple Convenient Mart on Youngstown Road.

James E. Dotson Jr., 27, of Idylwild Street Northeast, was charged in the death of Derek Thrash, 20, of Southern Boulevard Northwest.